I would like to introduce you to Mabel Mary Pepper, one of nine children, was born in East Leake in 1887 to George and Elizabeth Pepper.

Her father George was a labourer at the Lime Kiln, and her mother Elizabeth, who was nineteen years his junior, worked as a seamstress.

When Mabel was fourteen years old, she worked as a domestic servant for Julias Goldberg, a picture frame moulder on Mapperley Street in Nottingham. Her employer, Julias Goldberg, died in July 1901. It is likely that Mabel returned home at that time. She was later charged with sleeping out and being unmanageable at home.

In 1903, at the age of sixteen, Mabel was evicted from her lodgings and employment at Newarke Boarding House, 23 Oxford Street in Leicester for not obeying orders. She was found in "bad company" and charged again with "sleeping out." Mrs Phillips, a police court missionary, had permission from Catherine Bramwell Booth, granddaughter of the Salvation Army's founder, General William Booth, for Mabel to stay at the Salvation Army House. Mabel's mother, Elizabeth, refused to give her permission for Mabel to stay with the Salvation Army. The magistrates, unable to send Mabel to the safe house without consent, sentenced her to seven days in prison.

In 1904, Mabel was found sleeping rough in the garden of Frederick William Perkins Simpson on 18 Leicester Road in Loughborough. Mrs Phillips tried again to secure her a place in a house. Mabel refused and spent ten days in gaol. After her release from prison, Mabel was charged with assisting Frederick Johnson in a burglary in Beeby, Leicestershire. She was accused of stealing £5 2s 6d, trousers, a razor, braces and a thimble. Witness Susan Bainbridge said she met Mabel and a man going towards Frederick Johnson's house while walking from South Croxton to Beeby. Mabel admitted she had been to Beeby with a man named Sidney Cooper. At Beeby, they begged at several houses, and finding one empty, Cooper decided to break in. Cooper instructed Mabel to stand in the road and keep watch. Afterwards, the pair went to a barn near by, where Sidney Cooper changed his old trousers for the stolen ones. He found £5 in the pocket of the trousers and handed it to Mabel. That night, they slept under a haystack and then went to Leicester, where Cooper brought a pair of boots for Mabel. They then headed to Derby, where they stayed at a lodging house. On the evening of August 1, 1904, two detectives came to the lodging house. Sidney managed to escape arrest, but Mabel unfortunately did not. On 30 August 1904, she was charged with burglary.

In 1909, Mabel, aged twenty-two, together with Walter Whatsize (19) and Charles Orton (18), was charged with breaking into the shop of Thomas Hurst at 83 Clipstone Street in Leicester and stealing twenty-six pairs of boots to the value of £12.00. All three were also charged with receiving the boots, knowing they had been stolen. Mabel Pepper and Charles Orton, who lived together in furnished rooms at the back of Orchard Street in Leicester, were found to have fourteen pairs of boots in their rooms. When Mabel was arrested, she was wearing one of the stolen pairs. Mabel told the magistrates that she did not know the boots were stolen, and that she had received the boots from a man they had met at the Clock Tower. Mabel was found guilty of receiving stolen goods and sentenced to six months in prison with hard labour.

On 18 October 1910, she was sentenced to one-month hard labour for assault at Nottingham City police court. Between 1903 and 1910, Mabel had eleven convictions for sleeping out, begging, disorderly prostitution, drunk and disorderly and obscene language.

The photograph below was taken at Mabel's last known conviction. On 28 December 1910, Mabel and Frederick Swift were committed to trial at Loughborough Petty Sessions for the theft of two boots from Edward Hurst and Co of Churchgate in Loughborough. Mabel and Swift had been seen trying to sell the new boots at Rushes, a thoroughfare in Loughbrough. Inability to sell the boots, Mabel and Swift pawned them at Quails. Mabel and Swift were also charged with sealing a pair of boots from Arthur William Fox earlier in December. On 4 January 1911, both Mabel and Swift pleaded guilty to theft. Mabel was sentenced to eight months imprisonment with hard labour.

On Mabel's prison record, she is described as being 5 feet 4 ½ inches tall, with dark brown hair and blue eyes, pierced ears, and tattoos. On her forearm was a tattoo of a shamrock, heart, and clasped hands with the words “W Bala, I love M.J.” and “I love you L.H.S”. Mabel's last known address after being released from Leicester County Gaol on Welford Road was in a lodging house at number 2 Britannia Street in Leicester.